[OOC] Steampunk?

[robkelk]

Princess Principal: don't know anything about this one

Slightly-misleading high concept: John le Carré with Cavorite, retelling a particular Mark Twain story that it would be a major spoiler to name, in a Victorian/Edwardian-ish London split like Cold-War-era Berlin. The titular Princess is Victoria's granddaughter.

A somewhat better "elevator pitch", from the current draft of the page I'm putting together for All The Tropes:

Princess Principal is a Twelve-Episode Anime, originally aired in 2017.

Victorian-era Britain has discovered Cavorite and used it to become even stronger than it was in Real Life... but a revolution a decade ago has split the country, with the London Wall marking part of the border between East and West. There's still a war going on - not fought by soldiers, but by spies and subterfuge.

So, yes, this story is set in a steampunk version of the Cold War.

The Commonwealth has devised a plan - Project Changeling - to replace Albion's Princess Charlotte with an exact double, Ange le Carré. What they didn't count on was Princess deciding to join forces with Ange in order to become Queen and reunite the nation - a decision that she fully expects to end with her going to the guillotine. The two, along with Ange's partner Dorothy and Princess's school friend Beatrice, become an espionage team for the Commonwealth, taking mission orders from "Control". They have the advantage of Ange having possession of the "C Ball", the smallest known Cavorite device.

{{Needs More Info}}